Aspects of the present invention are directed to installing and maintaining building control equipment.
A typical building automation system includes a number of distributed devices that are interconnected with wired and wireless communication technology. Adding communication capabilities to such devices allows for the creation of applications that transcend the capabilities of a single device. For example, the communication capabilities make it possible to establish a light scene using two or more communicating light control devices. Networked devices also have the ability to report status and alarm conditions to other parts of the system. For example, a controller or server can track messages from the devices and, therefore, have the ability to monitor and control these devices from remote locations.
During the installation of building automation products, the installer is tasked to configure the devices such that each device is given a network address and other network configuration parameters, such as frequency channels or logical network identifier for wireless communication, etc. Still other necessary parameters may be application specific, such as minimal and maximal dim brightness for light dimmers, minimal and maximal target temperature range for thermostats or equipment driving parameters for HVAC or window treatment actuators. As such, the installation process must be performed by trained and supervised personal and cannot be considered as having been completed until a final commissioning procedure is conducted at the end of the installation to provide assurances that the building control system is handed over to the customer in working condition.
During the lifetime of the typical building automation system, components of the system can fail and will have to be replaced. Common failure modes are observed in electrical components that actuate an electrical load, such as a triac in a light dimmer or a relay for an HVAC actuator, and in power supply components, such as where a power supply of a device fails due to a line voltage spike. Devices that an end user can touch are also prone to mechanical abuse and such devices might have to be replaced not because of a functional failure but for esthetic reasons. With this said, it is rarely observed that the failure mode is due to a break-down of a configuration memory device within the device. The reason for this is that the memory is a solid-state component and does not contain any parts that can wear out.
In most applications, when a device fails, the repair will be performed by a person that is not expertly trained on the system since the repairs generally only involve the simple replacement of the device. However, in light of this fact, the repair person is required to removes the physical hardware of the device to be replaced along with the configuration memory as well. This drawback in current systems is due to the fact that the configuration memory is an intrinsic part of the device itself and requires that once the new device has been installed, it will have to be configured properly so that the full application of the device can be restored.